Polyvinyl chloride

Polyvinyl chloride Prices, markets & analysis

For those looking to keep abreast of the global Polyvinyl chloride market, our independent, unbiased pricing information, news and market analysis is an invaluable resource.

Whether you buy or sell Polyvinyl chloride or related products, you need to know about the prices and the factors driving the prices in the global Polyvinyl chloride market as they happen. Our network of price reporters throughout Asia, Europe and the US provide key local insights. We collate this intelligence into daily and weekly price reports, ensuring you have the up-to-date information you need at all times.

Polyvinyl chloride overview Transcript

Polyvinyl chloride, also known as PVC is a plastic resin. Its feedstocks are chlorine and ethylene. Its main end use for PVC is in the construction industry with pipes and profiles, windows and doors accounting for a large proportion of consumption.

Other applications include the automotive industry, cables and flooring.

The key driver in the market tends to be season led. Spring and summer are the strongest periods of construction activity. Movement in feedstock ethylene and chlorine prices also impact the PVC market as do events in the wider chloralkali chain as producers have to balance the electrochemical unit in order to make the business profitable.

The economy is also a key driver for PVC as downstream construction is strongly linked with GDP. The outlook for the market is unclear, but it is widely agreed that future growth will be largely driven by the emerging economies of Asia, Latin America, Africa and Eastern Europe.

Demand in the Eurozone is widely expected to contract as state measures delay public investment in construction. New plants coming on stream in Asia, Middle East, central and Eastern Europe will mean more competition for developed economies.

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Polyvinyl chloride news and market information products from ICIS

We offer the following regional Polyvinyl chloride analysis and news coverage
to keep you informed of factors and developments affecting prices
in the Polyvinyl chloride marketplace.

Price reporting

Price Reporting – More information about the price reports we publish on Polyvinyl chloride

Relationship chart

Upstream of Polyvinyl chloride

Polyvinyl chloride

Downstream of Polyvinyl chloride

Market overview

Polyvinyl chloride: Market overview

Updated to Q1 2015

Ethylene-based polyvinyl chloride (PVC) prices have started 2015 soft in most global markets, based on falling upstream costs.

In Asia, ethylene-based PVC prices have fallen below carbide-based PVC prices, which has led to a shift in purchasing among Asian players, including Chinese users for economic reasons. However, as only 20% of China’s PVC capacity is ethylene-based PVC, China has become a net importer at the end of 2014/early 2015 and this is expected to continue until upstream crude/naphtha prices start to recover. In the US, by contrast, exports are likely to continue to decline, as domestic demand is expected to improve and as prices in global markets are soft.

In Europe, PVC prices are under downward pressure for feedstock-related reasons for the most part, along with low seasonality in the downstream construction sector in early 2015, as well as good PVC supply. European PVC sellers are benefiting from the strength of the US dollar against the euro for export activity to some extent, even though main export markets such as Turkey are also soft for upstream reasons. In Europe and in Asia, for the most part, buying interest has been hand-to-mouth amid the bearish upstream sentiment and European players said that this is likely to continue until upstream costs start to stabilise.

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Polyvinyl Chloride Methodology

PVC is produced from the polymerisation of Vinyl Chloride Monomer (VCM). It is a versatile thermoplastic with a wide range of uses including pipes & fittings, profiles, cables, flooring, films & sheets

About

About Polyvinyl chloride

Polyvinyl chloride (PVC) occurs as white, amorphous, odourless powder. It is soluble in nitrobenzene, cyclohexanone, and tetrahydrofuran but insoluble in vinyl chloride. It is resistant to dilute alkalis and acids but is attacked by concentrated nitric and chromic acids.

Two types of PVC homopolymer are produced: rigid resins which are inflexible and hard; and flexible resins which contain a large proportion of plasticiser to make them soft and can be stretched. Products made from rigid PVC include pipe and conduit and roofing tiles.

Flexible PVC finds outlets in wire and cable coating, flooring, coated fabrics and shower curtains. Other outlets for flexible PVC are film and sheet and flooring.

Polymerisation is normally performed at 40-70oC with the vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) in a liquid state under pressure in a batch reactor. Suspension polymerisation is the most common PVC process because the resins produced are the most versatile and suitable for a wide range of applications.

The resin produced from the polymerisation process is hard and brittle and requires conversion into a compound by the incorporation of additives such as plasticisers, modifiers, stabilisers and processing aids before conversion into finished products.

Relationship chart

Upstream of Polyvinyl chloride

Polyvinyl chloride

Downstream of Polyvinyl chloride

ICIS will be speaking at Vinyl India

ICIS is proud to be supporting Vinyl India 2015 as a media partner. During the event, ICIS will also be giving delegates deeper insights into current developments and hot topics within China’s polyvinyl chloride (PVC) market, as well as its impact on global markets.